Hauling for Houg Special Services

I mentioned in one if the Pride threads that after my year at Butler, I was looking to move on and had applied and been accepted at Pride and was planning to go to orientation. I had also applied at Houg and they eventually also offered me a job and as it is at .35 cpm, .01 more than Pride, no per diem and is closer to home, I went with Houg.

So it's been 17 days and so far it's been great. Orientation was only one day though I had gone in the day before to do the drug screen and physical. They are a relatively small company, only 50 odd trucks, which are Penske and Ryder rentals. Mostly Freightliners with a few older Volvos. I have a 2011 Cascadia, 10 speed governed at 65, no APUs for now though they say they are looking at them. Paper logs, no Qualcomm though they are looking at something called Peoplenet, which I'm not familiar with.

They are based in Denver, CO and the biggest client in this area is Coors. Their usual way of operating is to send you out from Denver and try to get you right back but if that isn't possible, they will send you elsewhere. Miles have been good, pay period is Monday to Sunday so the first week was a partial, I was only able to turn in 1100, first full week was 2750 and this past week 3100. Doing a reset in San Diego at the moment before heading off to Ohio.

About the only gripes I have is that they only pay every two weeks and there is more paperwork than my previous companies but those are minor gripes, at best.

They do have social media policy and so I need to include the following:

"The opinions expressed here are the personal opinions of Blackadder47, Content published here is not monitored or approved by Houg Special Services. Inc. before it is posted and does not necessarily represent the views of HSS"

So if anyone has questions, feel free to ask.

Be safe.

 

From what they told me in orientation, a few years ago they were all O/O but are now a mix, I couldn't tell you the percentages.

Coors is the main customer in Denver, no matter what you take out of the Denver area, they try to get you back right away to cover Coors loads if needed. I've been dispatched on 4 loads from the yard in Commerce City, 2 have been Coors, one was potatoes out of Wray and the other beef from Colorado Premium in Greeley. They also haul beef out of Cargill in Fort Morgan but they say they won't dispatch trucks on those loads until they have been informed that the loads are ready and are loaded so no sitting for a couple of days waiting (been there, done that!)

Not sure why just the reefer companies would want to haul Coors, it isn't shipped cold despite the ads that say otherwise.

 

Honestly, I don't know. My address in Cheyenne is just a PO box but I will spend the majority of my home time in Colorado Springs and it just easiest for me to leave my car in Commerce City. They do go through Casper regularly on Coors loads up to Billing with the back haul out of Lovell, Wy.

 

6 weeks in with Houg and all is well. Miles averaging at least 3000 per week, the only week that didn't was the strawberry load from hell and I still ended up with 2800 that week.

 

Everything still going well, had a slow pay period over Memorial Day due my taking some time off, my Cascadia needing a service and Ryder having a hard time getting parts to repair something that kept giving me a check engine light. In the end, they kept the Cascadia and I got a brand new Prostar instead. The Prostar has a Dynosys APU so I no longer have to deal with DEF and runs 67 as opposed to 65. Downside is that is has less interior room and the jake brake is crap.

It certainly is nice dealing with a smaller company, everyone is pretty laid back and seems to genuinely appreciate the drivers. As long as you are not a screw-up, anyway.

 

3 months in and all is well here at Houg. It took a little while to figure out the system to be able to maximize miles but now I have it pretty much down pat. The month of July has been pretty much the same thing every week, start on Saturday with a 1000-1100 mile Coors load for Monday, return to Denver by Wednesday then take another Coors load to Gillette, WY, get it off the same day if you get there by 1700 then run over to Piedmont, SD for a load of mulch back to Denver arriving back on the yard Thursday early evening. By then I'll have pretty much used up my 70 so I take a 34 hour reset and come back on Saturday to do it all again. As a result, I'm averaging 3200 miles per week for July and getting a day off to relax.